(ANSA) – NEW DELHI, 04 JAN – The Delhi High Court today examined a petition calling for the release and transfer to a protected reserve of Shankar, the elephant from the Delhi zoo, the last one left in captivity and alone since the death of his partner, Bombai, in 2005.
The appeal was presented by Nikita Dhawan, a 16-year-old from the capital, who founded the animal rights group Youth For Animals.
The magistrates asked the heads of the federal government, the Delhi administration, the National Zoological Park, the Animal Welfare Board of India (Awbi) to explain what their plans are within the next three weeks.
The pair of African elephants was donated in 1998 by the Zimbabwean government to the then Indian president Shankar Dayal Sharma. After the death of Bombai, who had been named after the wife of the ambassador of the African country, Shankar has lived in solitude for 16 years.
A petition launched on Change.org by the boys of the animal rights association has collected 50,000 signatures in a few weeks: the appeal, relaunched on social networks, defines Shankar’s conditions as a “heartbreaker” and reports that Shankar spends in chains 17 hours a day and not has enough space to move around. “Furthermore, the proximity to railway tracks certainly creates stress and neurological damage in an animal that is so sensitive to sounds.”
The court adjourned the next hearing to March 9.
Nikita commented: “It is already a great victory, which gives us hope that Shankar will soon get his freedom”. (HANDLE).
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Source From: Ansa
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